Government on track to reduce grant program burdens: AG report

The federal government has followed through on in the instructions of a 2006 independent panel by lightening the administrative and reporting burden for government and grant contribution programs, the auditor general’s 2012 fall report determined.

In the wake of the 2006 independent Blue Ribbon Panel on Grants and Contributions’ conclusion that program applicants were facing exorbitant financial and administrative costs, the federal government responded in May 2008 with an action plan.

“With the action plan, the government committed to reducing the administrative and reporting burden placed on recipients,” the report says.

“We concluded that, to date … it has fulfilled most of the commitments it made applicable at the time of the audit.”

A new Policy on Transfer Payments was put in place to focus monitoring and reporting requirements on the risks associated with the programs and recipients, it continues.

“The Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat … provided leadership and guidance to federal organizations to assist them in their efforts to implement the policy,” the report says.

What the Treasury Board and the five departments examined didn’t do, however, was assess the impact of implementing the government’s action plan.

“They cannot determine how much, if at all, their actions have led to streamlined administrative processes within federal organizations or a reduced administrative burden on recipients,” the report says.

Simply put, the federal government implemented the panel’s recommendations, but never verified that they changes they made had the desired effects.

The Treasury Board agreed to implement a new results-based reporting tool to assess the impact of the reforms.